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Chamber hosts watch party
New video promotion ran on CNBC June 20
I had the opportunity to preview the movie, “Young Washington” that opens this weekend in theaters.
Over the past few months, I have read and watched a lot of American history dating back to the colonies, the Revolutionary War and the years following. What I had lost—or not realized—is just how long the war went on from the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, 1776 (we’ll celebrate 250 years next week) through the British surrender at Yorktown until the Treaty of Paris was signed on Sept. 3, 1783.
The movie covers Washington’s early life, pre-revolution, and you learn how many battles he lost and the wisdom of living to fight another day that he carried through the war. The movie starts with his childhood through the pre-Revolutionary War times and shows just how he developed the grit, resilience and character to lead the colonial army through tough times in brutal conditions. He served as a volunteer officer for the British against the French and Native Americans.
It will expand your view of our first president. You might also expand your understanding of providence when you realize how many musket ball holes were in his clothing that did not penetrate his body.
This is the home stretch for the state budget in Sacramento. Legislators passed a placeholder budget before the June 15 deadline so they will continue to get paid. Now, it’s time for the governor and legislative leaders—Democrats all—to cut the deal on the final budget. What’s damning is that the budget trailer bills–that enact the deal–are passed without legislative or lobbyist scrutiny and can contain critical changes without debate.
Other deals also are on the table such as debating whether to let measures go to the November ballot or agree to a compromise.
The Service Employees International Union is one outfit at the table, debating the so-called billionaires tax that would hit wealthy people with what’s described as a one-time 5% levy on their assets with the proceeds targeted for health care.
There’s been lots of whining since Congressional Republicans passed the so-called Big Beautiful Bill re-establishing working requirements for government provided health care and welfare. The target of the cuts (able-bodied adults living on the taxpayers) frequently isn’t mentioned in mainstream news coverage. Stay tuned to see where that lands.
Most egregious perhaps is the battle state employee unions are having with the governor over his mandate to return to the office four days a week. The unions are fighting to retain remote work and, in the spirit of throwing everything against the wall and seeing what might stick, actually have claimed that the governor’s order requires an environmental impact assessment.
That’s right, the continued mis-use of the California Environmental Quality Act—ironically signed by then-Gov. Ronald Reagan. The simple argument is there must be an impact on roads, traffic and air quality if 90,000 workers start commuting to offices again. That they were doing so daily before the Covid lockdown in 2020 is conveniently ignored. (Thanks to Wall Street Journal columnist James Freeman for pointing this out).
Perhaps a better solution would be to slice 10% of the work force to start and reduce the costs.
The Pleasanton Chamber of Commerce debuted what likely will become a new marketing video for the city on CNBC last Saturday. About 100 people gathered in front of the big screens at the Sunshine Saloon for early morning watch party that started at 7:30.
“Now We Know with Steve Guttenberg” featured several interviews with people touting the advantages of Pleasanton. Originally the producers tried to limit the interviews, but relented under pushback. The crew of speakers did a fine job laying out Pleasanton’s attributes as a place to do business with an historic downtown.
Watching this and a Fox national news report I was struck by how little correspondents and producers understand about businesses expanding and chasing workers to where they live. That and costs drove the ring of suburban business parks on the I-680 corridor as well as the warehouses surrounding the metro region over the Altamont Pass and northeast of the Carquinez Strait.
The chamber plans to use the video in a broader marketing campaign on a variety of platforms wrote CEO Yianna Theodorou in an email.
You can find it on YouTube or here: https://nowweknowtv.com/
